Gasoline. Do you price shop or just buy where it is close?

[Budnicks]

Wow those prices in California are unbelievable

Forced Taxes baby,
state, a city tax (in some cases), federal & road usage excise tax
supposed to be used to fund roads & repaving (rarely happens)
Govn.'s slush funds, used on social reengineering BS/PORK
we have a min. of $0.89 extra per/gal. (state alone) here rural areas
without a city tax (those vary too),
another like $0.59 cents a gal for the feds
(coastal areas it's well over a $1.50+ a gallon higher, taxes alone)
we are at least a dollar+ less up here, than by the coast,
where all the mass transit riders/voters all live...

nucken' futs
what the people that don't drive,
live in shitty's 'like lab rats', all on top of each other
in the concrete jungles
(most of them aren't from Calif. either, from points east, transients & transplants)
What they all have done to the rest of US
(inner-shitty masses, w/no drivers licenses/bus riders/mass transit riders/Lyft etc.)
they voted for higher gas taxes to be imposed, more taxes on everyone else
or
they usually are the treehuggers, use/push promote EVs
or don't own a car
& they don't pay (fuel) taxes to fund/fix the roads,
they use & drive on

 

[BrianS]

Depends on what I am driving! If I am in the truck I usually keep an eye out for the cheapest diesel and will even fill up the 50 gal transfer tank if it is cheap enough. Heck on my way back from Idaho I will typically stop in Nevada someplace like Rye Patch Chevron which is cheap and fill both tanks with diesel. That will get me by for quite a while since I ride the bike around here most of the time. As far as the bike goes I am a prima donna-, only top tier (Shell/Chevron) premium but then again I am only getting 3-4 gallons at a time. At one time I had an app that actually sorted the stations by price but stopped using it when gas was way cheaper.

 

[Kern Dog]

I still am waiting for someone to explain how paying 50 or 60 cents more a gallon at a "Chevron-Shell-Mobil is a sensible move.

 

[moparedtn]

I envy you guys being able to buy non-ethanol gas. You can't buy it around ATL because of the pollution issues. All the counties around ATL have to meet air quality standards and their cars must be emission tested back to a certain year.

What they didn't think all the way through with that is the fact that fuel economy is usually worse with blend gas
than it is with "straight" gas - reason being, there's less BTU's in it, since the alcohol has a lower BTU than the
gasoline.
The higher the alcohol content, the worse the mileage - so yeah, although gallon for gallon the emissions might be
lower, more of the blend will be burned than comparable straight gas would - so is it actually better for emissions?

 

[Duckmanreno]

I usually buy at the Walmart gas station in the little town where I live south of ATL. They have the cheapest gas south side of ATL and are always busy. Right now Reg. 2.84
Diesel is about 4.50

That’s amazing.
Regular Is 5.50 a gallon here in Reno.

 

[Kern Dog]

That could be the California proximity surcharge.

 

[33 IMP]

I heard that Vegas uses the California gas, not the 49 state stuff. Maybe Reno is the same?

 

[GetX'd]

We won't drive all over the place looking for the cheapest gas - because where we live there isn't any. But what we have is a secret sauce. All around where we live is absolutely ridiculous for everything that's a commodity - like gas and food has always been bad but now with this "engineered recession/inflation" it's phenomenally worse. Generally people have money around here so the theory is they can pay it. About 15/20 miles from our house is an area pretty well known to at least SoCal people called Little Saigon. Largest population of VN in the world outside Saigon, VN itself. For what ever reason EVERYTHING is much less expensive there - goods and services are so much cheaper It's ridiculous the other way. Out secret sauce is my in-laws being Vietnamese live there with most of the rest of the VN in the OC. My wife goes there frequently to see her mom, sister and nephews. While there all the grocery shopping gets done, fill up at least one vehicle, dry cleaning on and on. On the gas front we save about .75 cents a gallon. On groceries about 40% or more. To dry clean a shirt or garment where we live about $5/10 or more depending - in Little Saigon a little over a buck maybe two now per garment Everything outside the big boxes is like that. Food in restaurants etc. There are thousands of small businesses competing with each other and those people work there asses off for very thin profit margins. They're exceptionally frugal people coming from where they came from. The one anomaly is buying a home. Because they all want to live in the VN community that drives the prices of houses up beyond what most would likely pay anywhere else for a small old 50's home. But when one comes up it's gone in a heartbeat. I enjoy going with my wife to see the family and often we'll have a great lunch or dinner at our favorite places while there. Little Saigon is not all perfectly manicured like where we live. The stores and facilities are similar to what you'd encounter in VN - on the shoddy side. So you ask about gas and I tell more than you'd ever want to know about how we shop. It's kind of nice having a foreign country where everything is cheap, you don't need a passport and the food is great....... Lol

 

[BrianS]

I still am waiting for someone to explain how paying 50 or 60 cents more a gallon at a "Chevron-Shell-Mobil is a sensible move.

I have never been one to fuss about the brand of gas except for the bike but all the guys I ride with are adament about top tier fuel. I will say we had a big debate about this a few years ago at the company I was running jobs for. In an effort to save money we were filling the diesel welding machines up with cut rate fuel and the welding foremen was complaining the machines did not run as smooth as they did on Chevron fuel. We fought him on it and told him he was full of bs he eventually went to the owner of the company and complained and got his way. What you have to keep in mind is those particular flux core wire machines ran hot and fast with tight parameters where a 1/2 volt fluctuation made a difference in the quality of weld as well as production, seems like bs but he believed it enough to fight for what he believed at a cost to the company.

 

[bandit67]

I cannot comment on diesel fuel, as I don't know its normal distribution cycle. But, here in the south I have friends that deliver gas from the terminals to the various gas stations. They say the refinery's only make regular and premium and that is what is piped thru the gas pipeline to the terminals located across the states. If a truck load , 8000 gallons, is headed to the cheapie stations, he fills up and delivers as is. If going to a name brand station, they have different buildings with 5 gallon containers of the brands special additives, and they pour what ever the number of containers needed into the truck prior to filling up, to create that brands "special formula' gas. Midgrade is just a 50/50 mix regular and premium. E10 is 1000 gallons ethanol to 7000 gallons of whatever grade needed. Some folks believe the extra per gallon cost of some brands are worth it.

 

[Duckmanreno]

I heard that Vegas uses the California gas, not the 49 state stuff. Maybe Reno is the same?

Yes to my knowledge all the fuel here comes over the hill
From California In a pipeline.
Usually we are a few cents cheaper but now it’s about the same.
The prices are noticeable less in Carson city, Fallon or Fernely. But it’s farther for the fuel to be delivered lol

 

[Triplegreen500]

I use the gasbuddy app, tempered with "how far away is it, and how much will it save me?" mental math. If I burn a gallon of diesel getting there to save $3...I go for proximity instead of price. If it'll save me .60/gal over 35 gallons? Yep....I'm drivin'.

Brand I don't worry about, even for the bikes. The only time I "worry" about bike fuel is when they're sitting, and that's when they get a shot of SeaFoam. The EFI bikes don't give a rat's ***, but the carb bikes it definitely helps fight against ganked-up jets. The Charger also gets SeaFoam when it sits. I do have diesel stations I trust - my Cummins doesn't give a damn one way or the other (although I have fought the urge to go full-on heating fuel in it), but my Grand Cherokee will definitely do more regen cycles on "cheap" or "bad" diesel. But if it's a busy station and they go through their inventory quickly (most with good pricing do anyway), the Jeep does fine.

 

[Dan64]

When I asked this question to a friend of mine that owns a couple of stations I was told that they track how many people pay with corporate gas credit cards. It factors into how much they charge at that location because if the company is paying for the gas the driver doesn't care about price, only convenience.

 

[dodgedifferent2]

The closest station to home i have a points card that collects and the family can get groceries with those points. So many points per litre.

Sometimes i head to the native reserve and save roughly 10 cents per litre.

At 1.64 per litre which is $4.50 a gallon

 

[Hemirunner]

Crazy! It’s 4.19 here and I think somebody should should hang over it. I can’t believe anyone could afford to work at those gas prices.

 

[beanhead]

The difference between the ultra-cheap gas and the expensive, or even middle-priced stuff is in the quality. They buy the bottom-tier formulations and don't have as good of filtration, etc and you end up with more sand and water in your fuel. Ghetto gas is a no-no in my hot rods.

 

[33 IMP]

The local "name brand" stations are around thirty cents /gallon higher than the local cheap station, (let's call it malwart)
Malwart, is about 6 miles down the road, but the really cheap station is about 17 miles, Sammy's club. BUT, when I have bank business, or bills to pay, or want something like dog food (my four shepherds go thru a lot of dog food) it's good excuse to fill up the truck and the gas cans, at a price about 25 cents cheaper than malwart. Buy 40 or 50 or a 100 gallons, the extra five miles past the bank pays off.

 

[droptop2bottom]

I cross the border from Canada to the U.S.A. to get gas. On average it's $1.50 a gallon cheaper after figuring for the gallon difference and exchange rate.

 

[Dennis H]

I’d have to travel to save a few cents here so I don’t. While traveling in the modern car, we wait till we see some lower prices then fill. With the 69, jockeying to the pump is a factor with the fill being under the license plate and short hoses. Saw the high 2’s, 93 Sunoco, and Ethanol free while road tripping the Southeastern USA. None of that in these parts.

 

[cr8crshr]

I go to whatever station has fewer cars at the pumps at the time

So are you implying then that price and money spent doesn't concern you at all??? Asking for a Friend...cr8crshr/Bill